Law closes on Rathore
The man must get the worst punishment
Nineteen
years after a molestation attempt on
Ruchika, nemesis seems to be catching up with disgraced former DGP SPS
Rathore. His arrest seems imminent because the Panchkula District and Sessions Judge on Wednesday refused to grant him interim bail. It is only because of massive public outcry and media glare that the whole case has come to be revisited.

Banning N-tests
Ball remains in the court of US, China
Whenever there is a discussion on civilian nuclear cooperation between two countries, a reference to the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) cannot be ruled out. Thus, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama exchanging views on the CTBT in New Delhi on Tuesday was quite on the predictable lines.

Economy looks up
Rangarajan’s revised growth figure is reassuring
It is heartening that the Chairman of the Prime Minister’s Economic Advisory Council, Dr C. Rangarajan, has felt encouraged to revise his October forecast of 6.5 per cent GDP growth for the Indian economy for 2009-10 to between 7 and 7.5 per cent now. Dr Rangarajan is known to be cautious and is not given to hyperbole, so coming from him, the projection can be taken as realistic.

Afghanistan: The way outGive guarantees for its neutrality
by Maharajakrishna Rasgotra
The
people of Afghanistan have not forgotten what the Taliban did to them and their country when the extremists ruled Afghanistan with Pakistan’s political and military support. The Taliban are not popular in Afghanistan. Even the Pashtuns of Afghanistan want peace and security of life and property in their land. This basic reality does not receive much attention in the US.

Date with Audrey Hepburn
by Lieut-Gen Baljit Singh (retd.)
A casual evening gown worn by Audrey Hepburn for the filming of “Roman Holiday” was sold for eighty thousand dollars a few days ago. Now “Roman Holiday” was not just a box-office super-hit but it also ushered in a paradigm shift in the movies produced by Hollywood.

Integrate, do not divide states
by J L GuptaThe Americans, though migrants from different parts of the world, are just Americans. No one says that he is a European, Chinese, Japanese or Korean. Nor does he call himself an Alaskan, a Californian or a New Yorker. Not one of them describes himself as a Christian, Jew or a Muslim. They are only proud Americans.

The most inspiring people of 2009
by Johann HariIt was a dark year, 2009, sealing a dark decade. It began with the world in economic free-fall and the Gaza Strip being bombed to pieces (again). We watched the vicious crushing of a democratic uprising in Iran, a successful far-right coup in Honduras, and the intensification of the disastrous war in Afghanistan. It all ended at Brokenhagen, where the world’s leaders breezily decided to carry on cooking the planet.

US consumers, employers see a brighter future
by Tiffany HsuConsumer
confidence and expectations have hit fresh highs, and more employers are planning to hire workers in 2010, according to studies released Tuesday, signalling increasing economic strength.

Nineteen
years after a molestation attempt on Ruchika, nemesis seems to be catching up with disgraced former DGP SPS Rathore. His arrest seems imminent because the Panchkula District and Sessions Judge on Wednesday refused to grant him interim bail. It is only because of massive public outcry and media glare that the whole case has come to be revisited. What happened in the Best Bakery and Jessica Lal cases earlier, seems to be happening in the Ruchika molestation case as well. Complaints against Rathore by the tormented families were converted into FIRs and the legal net is closing in on him once again. He had torn it to shreds earlier thanks to the tremendous powers which he happened to enjoy as a senior police officer. He misused his authority and influence to the hilt, leading the molested Ruchika to commit suicide. Not only that, the brave families which lent her a helping hand also had to lead a harrowing time all these 19 years. It will be some consolation for them if he gets the toughest punishment for his monstrous deeds.

Nearly two decades have already gone by. Effort must be made to proceed with the case on the fast track so that he is served his just desserts in the shortest possible time. Care must also be taken that he is not able to influence the investigation through his tried and tested methods. After all, how he managed to scuttle even a CBI inquiry is well known. He should not succeed now.

And it is not only him who should pay for his crimes. There are many others who acted hands in glove with him. Politicians, policemen and others who were instrumental in the tragic end of Ruchika must all pay for their insensitivity. For instance, the school management had no right to throw her out when she was already a tormented pupil. Policemen who registered false cases against Ruchika’s brother and tortured him must not escape justice. Ferreting out all facts and acting on them with an iron hand is the only way to ensure that no other girl suffers at the hands of a power-drunk fiend.

Whenever there is a discussion on civilian nuclear cooperation between two countries, a reference to the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) cannot be ruled out. Thus, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama exchanging views on the CTBT in New Delhi on Tuesday was quite on the predictable lines. The Japanese, being the first and only victims of the nuclear bomb, do not miss an opportunity to advocate for a strict control on the proliferation of nuclear weapon technology. But India cannot be blamed for the CTBT not coming into force. As Dr Manmohan Singh made it clear, a new situation will arise when the US and China first ratify the CTBT. Only then can anybody raise the question why India, too, should not put its signature on it.

Despite not having ratified the CTBT, India continues to occupy the moral high ground because of its unilateral declaration of a moratorium on nuclear tests and adherence to the No First Use policy. In fact, India’s record as a nuclear weapon power is much better than that of China, which has harmed the non-proliferation cause by disguisedly helping Pakistan to acquire weapon-production capability.

India’s latest stance on the CTBT remains what the NDA government articulated after the 1998 nuclear tests — New Delhi would not come in the way of the treaty coming into force if the US and China went ahead and put their signature on it. There is a message in this for the Obama administration too, which has been more enthusiastic about taking up the nuclear non-proliferation and allied issues than the previous Bush administration. What Dr Manmohan Singh has stated, however, does not mean that India no longer considers the CTBT as a discriminatory regime. A treaty that allows those who acquired the nuclear bomb earlier than others to continue to posses it cannot help the cause of making the earth safe from the nuclear threat. The countries like Japan which are too much concerned about nuclear non-proliferation should, in fact, fight for total elimination of nuclear weapons and technology. There is need to go beyond the CTBT, as India has been insisting all these years.

It is heartening that the Chairman of the Prime Minister’s Economic Advisory Council, Dr C. Rangarajan, has felt encouraged to revise his October forecast of 6.5 per cent GDP growth for the Indian economy for 2009-10 to between 7 and 7.5 per cent now. Dr Rangarajan is known to be cautious and is not given to hyperbole, so coming from him, the projection can be taken as realistic. His optimism stems from the impressive 7.9 per cent growth recorded in the second quarter (July-September) of this financial year amid signs that the Indian economy is coming out of the economic slowdown that it has been confronted with in the wake of the global recession. Dr Rangarajan who earlier headed the Reserve Bank, has rightly indicated that the fiscal stimulus for growth that the government had announced to keep the economy on keel would continue until March-end 2010. It is important that this prop for the economy to stimulate demand be not taken away prematurely.

As Dr Rangarajan has pointed out, while the economy has been riding on the back of a good showing in the manufacturing and service sectors, there are some grey areas that need urgent attention. Agricultural productivity has decreased because of unfavourable seasonal conditions. The increase in food prices has been substantial. Rice, pulses and sugar witnessed sharp rise in prices. In fact, food inflation in the first week of December soared to a decade’s high of 20 per cent. A weak monsoon and deficient prospects for kharif production have contributed to it. A redeeming feature, however, is that the country had 44 million tonnes of foodgrains in stock by September-end, including 15 million tonnes of rice.

All in all, there is hope for the future of the Indian economy. Dr Rangarajan’s calculation that if a consistent growth of 4 per cent in agriculture and 9 per cent in the industrial and services sectors were maintained over the next two decades, it would propel India into the comity of developed nations is indeed reassuring and worth striving for.

Afghanistan: The way outGive guarantees for its neutrality
by Maharajakrishna Rasgotra

The
people of Afghanistan have not forgotten what the Taliban did to them and their country when the extremists ruled Afghanistan with Pakistan’s political and military support. The Taliban are not popular in Afghanistan. Even the Pashtuns of Afghanistan want peace and security of life and property in their land. This basic reality does not receive much attention in the US. The US and NATO forces are not fighting an unpopular war: the Afghan people are their best partner; they and the local authorities need to be motivated and mobilised for more active cooperation. Humiliating an elected President — Mr Hamid Karzai — is hardly the way to do it. There are better and quieter ways of ridding the regime of corruption.

There is a fair sprinkling of Pakistani Pashtuns and other ISI agents and operators in the ranks of the Taliban fighting the NATO forces in Afghanistan. They are trained, armed and financed by the Pakistan Army and the ISI; without that support and their safe havens in Pakistan, the Taliban will collapse in no time. The irony of this war is that for nearly a decade credulous US Administrations have been fighting the proxy and, at the same time, showering a bounty of money and arms on the barely hidden puppeteer.

Pakistan is a country of decent and peace-loving people struggling to create a democratic environment in which the Army and the ISI are brought under civilian control. The elected government cannot possibly have any sympathy for the terror combine of LeT-Taliban-Al-Qaeda, whose leaders and command centres are safely ensconced in Queta, Lahore and Karachi. The Pakistan Army created and nurtured the Taliban; it is sheer naiveté to expect it to fight them or even to restrain them in their safe havens in Pakistan.

American fears of an endless war in Afghanistan and Pakistan’s hopes for an early American retreat resulting in the restoration of Taliban rule in Kabul are both greatly exaggerated. There is no parallel here to the predicament, and retreat from Afghanistan, of the Soviet army. That army was fighting to protect and stabilise an unpopular Communist regime. The so-called jehad was supported not only by the Muslim world but also by the United States and European countries with lavish supplies of money, arms and manpower. There was no international support for the Soviet intervention; in fact, Moscow’s intentions and motives were suspect even in friendly countries. I remember Indira Gandhi telling Brezhnev in Moscow in October 1982 that he should withdraw Russian troops from Afghanistan; the sooner the better. Brezhnev said Taraki had been asking him for 10,000 Russian troops, that for a time he had repeatedly rejected the request but finally sent 10,000 troops, that now there were 100,000 of them there. He added for good measure: I donot know what they are doing there. I want to get out of Afghanistan, you know the area better; show me a wayout. Indira Gandhi had responded cryptically: Mr Secretary-General, the wayout is the same as the way in. During the following two days it fell on me to explain her the “meaning” — but that is a long story for another day.

In contrast to those times, Kabul now has an elected government, and truly the Taliban enjoy the support of only one country — Pakistan — or more specifically Pakistan’s Army and the ISI, all utterly dependent on the US for arms, money and other kinds of support. This war can be brought to a successful conclusion in 18 to 24 month’s provided, in recognition of the stark and painful reality of the Pakistan Army’s role in this war, Washington suspends all arms and economic aid to Pakistan for two years. The resources thus saved should be used for educational and other social development activity in Afghanistan. Second, NATO forces should stop the flow of drugs out of Helmand province — a major source of finance for the Taliban — ban poppy cultivation, compensate the cultivators and initiate alternative agricultural development programmes.

Concerns about Pakistan’s internal stability and peace or its nuclear weapons falling in the hands of non-state actors are greatly magnified. Nor is there the danger of the country falling apart: Pakistan’s Army and police are strong enough to effectively deal with any such contingency or threat. The electoral process will finally defeat and eliminate the religious radicals who are holding this large and potentially rich country to ransom.

In its endeavourer to end the war and bring peace and stability to Afghanistan, Washington is mistaken in ignoring Afghanistan’s neighbours — Iran, the Central Asian Republics, Russia, China and India. They are all interested in Afghanistan’s integrity, independence, unity, peace and stability. Afghanistan-related international conferences in Bonn, New York and Washington D.C. have produced little worthwhile result.

The US should now take the initiative to convene a conference, in Kabul, of countries sharing frontiers with Afghanistan plus China, India, Russia, the EU and the UN Secretary-General. The conference should have a one-point agenda: An agreement guaranteeing Afghanistan’s independence and neutrality, and the stationing in Afghanistan of a small UN force for 10 years symbolising the UN Security Council’s endorsement of the agreement. This conference could also help determine the size of Afghanistan’s armed forces and the ways and means of financing them for a decade or two.

Such a conference, I believe, will have a moderating effect on the Pakistan Army’s strategic ambitions vis-à-vis the Gulf region and Central Asia and its periodic military adventures to subjugate Afghanistan for the fulfilment of those ambitions.

Pakistan is a solid land of sturdy, talented and hardworking people. It has been impoverished by an over-sized and pugnacious Army. In a globalising world with softening frontiers, it is dangerous for the Army of any country, especially a country of Pakistan’s size and importance, to be the decision-maker of its foreign and security policies. In the way of the armies’ greater than the true needs of the countries to which they belong, the Pakistan Army is a victim of the extravagant illusion that the world and Pakistan’s neighbours owe it larger territorial expanse and greater depth in strategic space. This is the only Army in the world which has, in the space of half century, provoked and fought four open wars and three proxy wars on both flanks of Pakistan, putting the country itself at risk.

Tragically, the Pakistan Army’s ambitions and its Afghanistan policy spell grave dangers for the country which it fails to see. If its Taliban henchmen succeed in recapturing Kabul, they will, once again, be faced with an unending civil war supported, openly or surreptitiously, by Iran, Afghanistan’s Central Asian neighbours, Russia and India. Two possibilities could then emerge — both of great detriment to Pakistan.

A prolonged civil war could involve the whole region in a conflict which Pakistan and the Taliban could not possibly win, and its defeat, or even a stalemate, would be followed by long-lasting resentment and sporadic conflicts. Or, in the event of Taliban rule getting firmly established in eastern and southern Afghanistan, there will be irresistible revival of the demand for an independent Pashtun state straddling the Durand Line. This would, of course, be a tragedy for Afghanistan as the country would be permanently divided, but with such an unfortunate development will also begin the unravelling of Pakistan.

Neither eventuality would serve any Indian interest. Peace and stability in the AF-Pak region, on the other hand, will facilitate the establishment of roadways, railways and pipeline networks which will carry people, goods and services between South-East Asia and India to Central Asia, Russia and Europe with great profit in trade and in transit fees to Pakistan and Afghanistan. Hopefully, then, a day will also dawn when Pakistan will discover that India is its best friend and well-wisher, and not its enemy.

The initiative for a conference of the kind proposed above should come, most appropriately, from the Obama administration. But are the minds in Washington open to courses other than a troop surge and withdrawal under the cover of a sham success, leaving Afghanistan to Al-Qaeda and God? Diplomacy involving Afghanistan’s immediate neighbours has not been tried. It deserves a chance.n

A casual evening gown worn by Audrey Hepburn for the filming of “Roman Holiday” was sold for eighty thousand dollars a few days ago. Now “Roman Holiday” was not just a box-office super-hit but it also ushered in a paradigm shift in the movies produced by Hollywood. Here was Audrey Hepburn who with a mixture of untamed vivaciousness, innocence, impish smile, boyish hair style and exquisitely tailored trousers and shirts (as opposed to pleated skirts and frilly blouses), became a symbol of the new, alluring feminism.

There was something in the manner she kick-started her Vespa Scooter, accelerating to 80 KMPH from a cold start within seconds, and head scarf fluttering wildly which made Audrey Hepburn also the harbinger of a certain subtle aspect of women’s emancipation the world over. There were no scooters in India then. So a handful of bold women took to bicycling.

A few years after its premier, Roman Holiday came up for screening on a Saturday evening at the Indian Military Academy, Dehradun. By then such was the Audrey Hepburn spell over the young and the old alike that the cinema management agreed to three consecutive screenings of the movie.

But what especially caught my fancy this time was the hoarding over the cinema wall. In the background was the picture of the Trevi fountain in Rome and superimposed over it was a life size image of Audrey Hepburn from waist upwards. It looked a copy of that stunning studio portrait of the actress made by Karsh of Ottawa and published in the book entitled “Portraits of Greatness”.

This was also the time when I had graduated to a state-of-the-art single lens reflex, Rollieflex camera. Its novel ground glass viewing screen was of the same dimensions as the size of the film negative which made focusing of the object and composing of the picture easier and exciting. So what better opportunity to test out the camera than photographing Audrey Hepburn from the cinema poster?

I exposed one entire film-roll of 12 frames with varying combinations of aperture opening and shutter speed. The results were better than my wildest hopes. The largest blow-up that a Dehradun photo-studio could handle was 14 by 12 inches. And one of these under a cut-mount frame went up on the wall facing my bed. For several days there was constant comings and goings to my room till the lights-out bugle.

During a routine tour of the rooms one day, the inspecting officer noticed the framed portrait. And to him it was synonymous with the forbidden display of glam-girl pin ups! So the next day, I was arraigned before the company commander, charged with “an act unbecoming the conduct of a gentleman-cadet”. While reading out the offence report the company commander held aloft the framed photograph as an “exhibit” linked to my crime. Fortunately this being my first act of misdemeanor, I was administered a mere warning and promptly marched out of the office.

But the Audrey Hepburn portrait was confiscated and it went up on the wall facing the bed of the company
commander!

The Americans, though migrants from different parts of the world, are just Americans. No one says that he is a European, Chinese, Japanese or Korean. Nor does he call himself an Alaskan, a Californian or a New Yorker. Not one of them describes himself as a Christian, Jew or a Muslim. They are only proud Americans. The Europeans have formed the European Union and have introduced a common currency. The Germans have broken the Berlin wall. The world is breaking barriers. But we seem to be creating new ones.

In India, ‘I’ is the dominant factor. Every Indian is an individual. He is an Andhraite or Assamese, a Bengali, Bihari, Haryanvi, Kashmiri, Maharashtrian, Malyali, Punjabi or a Tamilian. He is a Christian, Hindu, Muslim or a Sikh. He is an Aiyer or Aiyanger, a Bania or a Brahman, a Jat or a Jatt, a Reddy or a Rao. The list can be never ending. And each one is interested in the preservation of his distinct identity. Culture and language. It is becoming difficult to find an Indian. Diversity has always been a stark reality. But today the unity is being threatened.

Our leaders of yester years had fought and won freedom. They were patriots. They had worked for integration of the smaller states in the Union. The leaders of today are dividing the states. They sow the seeds and then exploit the divisive propensities of the people. Just to perpetuate and preserve their own positions. Their small fiefdoms. For petty personal gains. And any excuse is good enough. Language. Sons of soil. Or any other. Then, they go on fast. Threaten to die. Arouse public sympathy and exploit the sentiment. Apprehending disruption of law and order, the government yields. Sometimes too readily. Is it appropriate?

Sacrificing life for national unity is understandable. It may be patriotic. But dying to force division should be totally unacceptable. Rewarding those who threaten to die for the disintegration of the state is a sacrilege. The fast is an attempt to commit suicide and must be treated as a pure and simple offence. Nothing more.

Today, reorganisation of states has become a regular ritual. The parliamentary pundits perform it periodically without any delay or demur. The result is that not only India but even the Indian Union has grown numerically. While the population has gone beyond a billion and we are doing little about it, the number of states has already risen to 26. And we all know the implications. Each new State means a new governor. Another chief minister and his ministers. And then the cascading effect on the bureaucracy. The taxpayer alone has to bear the additional burden of the cars, kothis and salaries for all of them.

We, as people, must realise that creation of each State only means more expense. It does not help the ‘aam aadmi.’ It does not lead to more opportunities for education and employment. It does not help the needy. It serves only the greedy. The funds are largely exhausted in providing for the perks. Almost nothing remains that may possibly percolate to the poor. The state then borrows from almost everywhere. And the people are doomed to leave behind the next generation under debt.

India is a rich country. It is rich in resources. We have fertile land. Flora and fauna. Mountains and mines. Perennial rivers. And then a billion pair of hands. These assets are enough to take a nation to the top of the world. Japan is an example for all to emulate. After facing an atomic holocaust and with virtually no resources of its own, the nation has reached the pinnacle of economic growth. In comparison, we are very poor. A majority of our people do not get two square meals a day. They do not have a roof over their heads. The children do not get admission in the schools. The sick cannot get a bed in hospital. The water is not potable. There is abject poverty in the midst of such plenty. It stares us in the face. We can no longer afford to look the other way.

Today, we really need to wage a war against illiteracy, poverty and unemployment. We have to work hard and fight against the ills of corruption, inefficiency and red tape. We must realise that every Indian deserves a dignified existence. We need hospitals and houses. Schools with adequate infrastructure. Institutions to impart vocational training to our young men so that they are able to earn their livelihood. The state must ensure certain minimum work and wage for the millions of unemployed youth. Only then the ‘right to life’ guaranteed as a fundamental right in the Constitution can become a reality.

To the masses it does not matter whether the minister wears a blue, green or white turban. The common man is worried about two square meals a day. He needs a shelter to protect himself against the vagaries of weather. A bed in hospital for the sick. A seat in the school for his child. Potable water to drink. Our energies must be focussed on providing the basic necessities to the teeming and toiling masses of India. We should not be spending our time and resources in dividing the states into non-viable units of administration.

As we enter the year 2010, let us resolve to unite. Not to divide states. We should decide and be determined to reward efforts for integration and punish those who work for
division.

It was a dark year, 2009, sealing a dark decade. It began with the world in economic free-fall and the Gaza Strip being bombed to pieces (again). We watched the vicious crushing of a democratic uprising in Iran, a successful far-right coup in Honduras, and the intensification of the disastrous war in Afghanistan. It all ended at Brokenhagen, where the world’s leaders breezily decided to carry on cooking the planet.

But in the midst of all this there were extraordinary points of light, generated by people who have refused to drink the cheap sedative of despair. The left-wing newsman Wes Nisker said in his final broadcast: “If you don’t like the news, go out and make some of your own.” I want – in the final moments of 2009 – to celebrate the people who, this year, did just that: the men and women who didn’t slump, but realised that the worse the world gets, the harder people of goodwill have to work to put it right.

Inspiration One: Denis Mukwege. The war in the Congo is the worst since Adolf Hitler marched across Europe: it has killed more than 5 million people and counting. As I witnessed when I reported on the war in 2006, the violence has been turned primarily on the country’s women: one favourite tactic is to gang-rape a woman and then shoot her in her private parts. For years these women were simply left to die in the bush. But one man – a soft-spoken Congolese gynaecologist with a gentle smile – decided to do something mad, something impossible. With scarcely any equipment and no funding, he set up a secret clinic for these women.

He was told he would be killed by the militias for undoing their “work”. The threats said his own daughters would be murdered if he didn’t stop. Everyone thought he was mad. But he knew it was the right thing to do. He became the Oscar Schindler of the Congolese mass rapes, saving the lives of tens of thousands of women. In the midst of a moral Chernobyl, he showed that the best human instincts can survive and, in time, prevail. It is rumoured he was number two in the Nobel Committee’s list for the Peace Prize. He should have won.

Inspiration Two: Liu Xiaobo. A year ago, a petition began to circulate in China demanding that its one billion citizens be allowed to think and speak freely. “We should end the practice of viewing words as crimes,” it said. As if they were the Irony Police, the Chinese authorities promptly arrested the authors and many of its signatories. One of the most articulate and brave – Liu Xiaobo – was sentenced to 11 years in a re-education camp for “subversion”.

The Chinese authorities believe human rights are a “plot” to weaken China. In fact, China will be immeasurably stronger when it stops persecuting its citizens when they try to develop their minds and defend each other.

Liu is not alone. Hu Jia is in prison for warning about China’s hidden Aids crisis. Huang Qi is in jail for warning that the poor construction of school buildings in Sichuan – because the builders bribed the local authorities – meant hundreds of children died unnecessarily in the earthquake. There is a long list, and for every prisoner, thousands more are too frightened to speak. But these dissidents stand as models of the truly great nation China will be one day, when it stops persecuting these people and starts electing them.

Inspiration Three: Evo Morales and Malalai Joya. Although they were born thousands of miles apart, these two people embody what real democracy can mean. When Evo Morales was a child, the indigenous peoples of Bolivia weren’t even allowed to set foot in the capital’s central square, which was reserved for white people. Today, he is the President, and for the first time in his country’s history, he is diverting the billions raised from the country’s natural resources away from the pockets of US corporations. It is building schools and hospitals for people who had nothing, and poverty is being eradicated in a stunning burst of progress.

Malalai Joya is the youngest woman ever to be elected in Afghanistan, and she was swiftly banned from taking her seat because she kept speaking up for the people who elected her – against the violent fundamentalist warlords our governments have put in charge of the country. They keep trying to murder her, but she says: “I don’t fear death, I fear remaining silent in the face of injustice ... I am ready, wherever and whenever you might strike. You can cut down the flower, but nothing can stop the coming of the spring.”

She and Morales are authentic democrats, in contrast to the parody of it offered by Hamid Karzai and – too often – our own leaders.

Inspiration Four: Amy Goodman and the team at Democracy Now! It’s not hard to despair of the US at the moment, when even the silver-tongued King of Change seems unable to get real healthcare and cuts in warming gases through his corrupt Senate, and he is ramming harder into Afghanistan. A large part of the problem is the atrocious US broadcast media. The TV news sees everything from the perspective of the rich, and ridicules arguments for progress. It serves its owners and its advertisers by poisoning every political debate with death-panel distractions and silence for the things that matter.

But there is one remarkable exception. Broadcasting from a tiny studio in New York, on a budget raised entirely from its viewers, comes Democracy Now! Every day, the hour-long broadcast – hosted by the wonderful Amy Goodman – tells the real news. While the nightly news fills up with junk and gossip, they calmly, cleverly explain what is really happening. For example, while ABC and NBC were fixating on Tiger Woods’ peccadilloes, Democracy Now! was in Copenhagen, explaining how the world’s rainforests were being stiffed. They, at least, can tell the trees from the Woods. It is the best single source for making sense of the world that I know – and it is a model of what the American media could be if it treated its viewers with respect.

Inspiration Five: Peter Tatchell. Long before it was trendy to support gay equality, there was Peter Tatchell, taking huge risks for what was right. As one of the pioneers of direct action to oppose bigotry against gay people, he was never afraid to put his own body in the path of bigots.

What do they all have in common, all these people? When Mukwege built his clinic, they said he’d be dead within a week. When Tatchell said gay people could be equal, they laughed in his face. When Morales and Joya ran for office, they said people like them could never win. They dismiss Liu and Goodman now; but their arguments will win, in time.

They show that when the world gets worse, that’s not a reason to slink away in despair. On the contrary: it’s a reason to work harder and aim higher. As the essayist Rebecca Solnit says: “Hope is not a lottery ticket you can sit on the sofa and clutch, feeling lucky. It is an axe you break down doors with in an emergency. Hope should shove you out the door, because it will take everything you have to steer the future away from endless war, from the annihilation of the earth’s treasures and the grinding down of the poor and marginal... To hope is to give yourself to the future – and that commitment to the future is what makes the present inhabitable.” That should be the epitaph for these remarkable people – and for 2009.n

Consumer
confidence and expectations have hit fresh highs, and more employers are planning to hire workers in 2010, according to studies released Tuesday, signalling increasing economic strength.

A consumer expectations index formulated by the Conference Board rose to its highest level in two years, but Americans still feel pessimistic about their current state. The organization’s “present situation index” fell to its lowest point in 26 years.

“While the worst of the economic times are behind us, it’s not euphoria,” said Lynn Franco, director of the board’s Consumer Research Centre. “Confidence is stronger than when we started the year, but for much of the last several months we’ve been moving sideways.”

The consumer confidence index rose to 52.9 in December, a three-month high after increasing to 50.6 in November from October’s 48.7 and February’s historic low of 25.3.

But confidence is still shaky, according to the index, which last reached a “stable” 90.6 reading in 2007. The data are based on a monthly survey conducted by research company TNS covering a sample of 5,000 U.S. households.

Consumer spending, however, is still moving ahead at “fairly respectable rates,” said Brian Bethune, chief U.S. financial economist for IHS Global Insight. But the steep discounts and inventory clearance sales that are helping spending now could create a vacuum in early 2010.

“Barring a New Year’s miracle in the labour markets, it will be an enormous challenge to maintain forward momentum on real consumer spending,” he
said in a statement.

Still, expectations are high for the next six months, buoyed by improvements in the business and labour markets. The Conference Board index jumped to 75.6 from 70.3 in November, reaching the highest level since the 75.8 recorded in December 2007.

But worries about short-term income, which Franco said probably would affect spending early in the new year, dragged down the present situation index to 18.8 from 21.2 in November. The index hit a low of 17.5 in February 1983.

A separate report by online jobs site CareerBuilder.com had more mixed news.

While 20 percent of employers said they would add full-time, permanent workers in 2010, compared with 14 percent who said they would do so in 2009, actual job growth probably won’t arrive until the second quarter.

“There have been many signs over the past few months that point to the healing of the U.S. economy, especially the continued decrease in the number of jobs lost per month,” CareerBuilder.com Chief Executive Matt Ferguson said in a statement.

Just 9 percent of employers intend to cut workers in 2010, while 16 percent said they would cut employees in 2009. Another 61 percent said their staffing levels probably will stay the same, according to the study, which surveyed more than 2,700 hiring and human resource professionals in November.n